Richard Branson is about to fulfill his childhood dream: The billionaire wants to fly into space on Sunday. You can read what it’s about and how the flight is going in the news ticker.
Spaceport America – Richard Branson has been waiting for this day for many years, today (Sunday, July 11, 2021) his childhood dream will come true: Branson will fly into space. The 22nd test flight of his “VSS Unity” spaceplane is said to be the flight that will take Branson into space for a short time before returning to Earth. The spaceplane is fully occupied for the first time: In addition to two pilots, there are four space travelers on board, all of them employees of Branson’s company Virgin Galactic, which in the future wants to regularly send space tourists into space.
“I really believe that space is ours all,” Branson said. “It is one thing to dream of making space more accessible for everyone, but it is another thing to make this dream come true with an incredible team.” According to Branson, he has been dreaming of it since the first moon landing * 52 years ago Space. After a long development period and several setbacks – among other things, the co-pilot died in a test flight in 2014, the pilot was seriously injured – the time has come.
Richard Branson flies into space with Virgin Galactic – This is how the flight works
Virgin Galactic takes a different approach to the path into space than, for example, Blue Origin by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who uses a rocket to transport a space capsule into space and then parachute it. Virgin Galactic uses a carrier aircraft (“White Knight Two”) to which the spaceplane “VSS Unity” is attached.
The “rocket launch” will initially look like an airplane launch: the carrier aircraft will take off around 4.30 p.m. and will climb to an altitude of around 15 kilometers. Then the “VSS Unity” spaceplane disconnects and takes off. The “VSS Unity” with Richard Branson and colleagues on board will accelerate up to three times the speed of sound (around 3,700 km / h) and rise further. The acceleration ends at a height of almost 90 kilometers, the people on board can then enjoy the weightlessness and the view of the earth’s curvature for about 5 minutes before the spaceplane returns to earth and lands like an airplane. The entire flight should take around one and a half to two hours.
Richard Branson on his way into space: is he the first space tourist?
If the launch succeeds on July 11, 2021 *, Richard Branson will not be the first space tourist, but the first private person on board a private space flight. NASA wanted to send the first private space traveler into space as early as 1986: the teacher Christa McAuliffe got on board the space shuttle “Challenger”, which exploded shortly after take-off. Subsequently, NASA banned similar projects. The first space tourist traveled into space with a Russian ticket in 2001: Dennis Tito flew for 20 million US dollars on board a Russian Soyuz capsule to the International Space Station.
For a place on board the space capsule, which Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is supposed to transport into space in a few days (planned for July 20, 2021 *), an unidentified person recently paid $ 28 million. Flights with Virgin Galactic should be cheaper. So far there should be around 750 registrations for space flights from Virgin Galactic – a seat should cost up to 250,000 dollars.
“Space Race” of the billionaires: Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos in a duel for space
Even if Richard Branson denies it *: There is a kind of “Space Race”, a race into space between the billionaires and space travel entrepreneurs Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos *. If the flight succeeds on July 11, 2021, Branson has beaten Bezos by nine days. But the discussion should not stop afterwards either: After all, the “VSS Unity” from Virgin Galactic does not make it over the 100-kilometer limit, which is internationally recognized as the limit into space (Kármán line). Branson will only make it across the 50-mile line recognized by the United States as the boundary to space.
Space newsletter
Private space travel *, rockets or satellites, discoveries in astronomy * all about black holes, stars and planets – with the FR newsletter about astronomy and space travel you always stay informed.
But private space travel, and especially space tourism, is likely to be a business for more than one company: The Swiss bank UBS assumes that space travel will be a large market – ranging in volume up to three billion US dollars by 2030 is the talk. A third billionaire wants to participate in this market: Elon Musk has not yet planned his own flight into space, but will probably send the first space tourists into space in 2021 with SpaceX and its “Crew Dragon” capsule. This flight is said to be a little more sustainable than the first flights of the billionaires Bezos and Branson: SpaceX’s “Crew Dragon” capsule is said to orbit the earth for three days before returning to earth. (Tanja Banner) * fr.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA.
